ast's theatrical set-piece introduces candidate
Greeley as "The Modern Mazeppa in "What I know About The Road From
Cincinnati To-." It is a travesty of the venerable theatrical war-horse
Mazeppa (or The Wild Horse of Tartary), dating from 1830 and itself based on a
swashbuckling 1819 poem by Lord Byron. The play's appeal depended originally on
a hair-raising final scene in which a young Polish nobleman is stripped of his
clothing by a villainous count, tied to the back of a spirited stallion and the
two, in tandem, gallop across the stage on an elevated runway. An 1861
production starring the seductive actress Adah Isaacs Mencken became an
overnight sensation when it was offered in New York City and Albany.
Adah Mencken's version generated even more interest than usual because she
played the male hero, wearing a flesh-colored body stocking which created the
illusion that she was totally naked, and because the runway was extended out
into the audience to further surround and engage the spectators. In the best
traditions of the special effects of the day, lightning flashed, snow fell,
wolves howled and vultures circled. A moving background panorama of craggy peaks
and yawning gorges passed before wondering eyes. After fighting a duel with the
evil count, Adah Mencken was divested of her black cloak and prepared for her
unbridled ride in what has been described as the "first public striptease
act ever witnessed in a theater."
An editorial in the New York Tribune, presumably penned by Greeley, took a dim
view: "We cannot believe that the actress scheduled to appear before our
citizenry in Mazeppa would so shock and revolt decent people by exposing her
body in the nude." In Nast's cartoon, eleven years later, Greeley (like
Adah Mencken) is the captive passenger, bound by a single rope, on a perilous
course for the executive mansion atop the cliff in the upper-right. Although it
is highly doubtful that Greeley was ever a witness to Adah Mencken's sensational
performance, it is possible that an avid theatrical partisan like Nast would
have seen it at the earliest opportunity. (He drew Jefferson Davis as "The
Modern Mazeppa" for Phunny Phellow in June 1862.)
Greeley's Liberal Republican steed, with the "Gratz Brown" tag on its
tail, is receiving a send-off (upper left) from the Cincinnati Convention
leaders (l-r): Senators Reuben Fenton, Lyman Trumbull, Carl Schurz, and Thomas
Tipton. The inevitable paper in Greeley's pocket is titled "What I Know
About Horsemanship, H.G." The tiny figure just behind Schurz's right arm
seems to represent a first attempt at sketching Whitelaw Reid, the Tribune's
acting editor and major orchestrator of Greeley's nomination.